Thursday, 19 March 2015

Disciples Of Christ (DoC) is a band I've had my eye on ever since they floored me when I saw them play with Triac in 2011. DoC's recorded output at the time was not as intense as their live set however; their demo and split with Mind As Prison were decent but didn't particularly stand out. It wasn't until their split LP with Triac dropped in 2012 that it was clear they had come into their own and established themselves as one of the best contemporary grind bands.

DoC's approach to grind draws heavily from the chaotic, unpredictable nature of 90s powerviolence bands such as Despise You and No Comment, and adds the dirtiness of bands such as Excruciating Terror and Warsore along with the muddy, dirging, disgusting feel of late 80s/early 90s grind bands such as Ulcerous Phlegm which, as you can imagine, is absolutely devastating. They're fast, yet unpredictable; they're noisy, they're relentless, they're absolutely amazing.

This tape features four rerecorded songs from their split with Triac and "Decomposition Fantasy" EP, along with six new tracks which remain consistent with quality of songwriting and intensity of the previously mentioned releases. If you've listened to those already, you know what to expect, but if you haven't, you're in for some of the best grind 2015 has to offer. Special thanks to go my friend over at eyehatetapes for lending me his copy for this rip.

Nervous Habit are a four piece hardcore band with members from various parts of Sydney/Newcastle and have recently dropped this demo showcasing their equally manic and progressive spin on the genre. With influences firmly rooted in outsider hardcore and early Boston hardcore, Nervous habit also incorporate elements of post punk, death rock and garage rock into their sound.
With a guitar that's been permanently encased in a thick layer of chorus and a seven-and-a-half minute long instrumental outro, this demo does set itself apart from most other current Australian hardcore bands almost immediately. The frantic drumming and snarled/growled vocals are the icing on the cake, pairing the band's weirder tendencies with a primal, aggressive energy. Nervous Habit are a local(ish) band playing fast, mean (and also mid-tempo) hardcore in the same vein as some of my favourite bands, and honestly I couldn't ask for more. And if that list of bands up the top of this post hasn't at least got you intrigued, well you're just plain wrong.
If you've been enticed (and you should be), check out the bandcamp or download link below. The band should have physical copies of the demo soon, so hit them up via their Facebook page HERE if you're after a tape you can caress in your grubby little hands.

If you like your hardcore very loosely held together, raw and dripping with malice - I may just have the thing for you,
Hailing from Melbourne, Velvet Whip are purveyors of the aforementioned traits, spewing out caustic breakneck jams that are drenched in so much noise and distortion they just bleed into each other. Sporting a decidedly lo-fi aesthetic (not helped by the fact I ripped 'Bronze Medallion' from tape myself), the band beef up their ferocious sound with nods to everything from improvisational noise, psychedelic and classic rock (their name is taken from a Hawkwind song funnily enough) and 80s outsider hardcore (think Siege in Grim Reaper mode or United Mutation). Certainly one of Australia's most unhinged and experimental hardcore bands and one of my personal favourites.
Included here are Velvet Whip's three current releases, in glorious digital format for your listening pleasure. For those of you keen to pick up a physical copy, you can find the Bronze Medallion tape at at the Cool Death Records store here. You may also want to keep your eyes and ears primed for the new Velvet Whip tape that's due later this year.

When the first stabs of treble drenched, over-driven guitar ring out, it sounds as if Blank Veins are about to take you straight into abstract, no-wave territory. But as the first track progresses and the drums and bass kick in, this bad boy veers straight into sleazy, pummeling noise rock territory. And fuck, as soon as the sax snaked its way in through the cacophony I was completely sold.
Blank Veins take a simple, atonal riff and drive it forward for the entire duration of the song - completely deconstructing it and annihilating it in the process while the rhythm section pounds away in the background. Add intermittent background noise, yelled/slurred vocals and of course the sax and you have some sort of bastard child born from the fling between a Rhode Island noise rock band and an ex-East Village punk. Totally nihilistic, unrelenting stuff.

TRACKLISTING:
1. From One Head to Another
2. The Heat was Rising
3. Soaking Text
4. White Lights and Black Dots

Hurricane Death are a relatively new band from Brisbane, Australia featuring members of everyone's favourite defunct, underage grind/hardcore group Puke. While still very much melding metallic crunch with the glorious stompy energy of hardcore, Hurricane Death are more indebted to the likes of Bolt Thrower or Terrorizer as well as the brawnier side of bands such as Mind Eraser or Mammoth Grinder. This demo has super gruff vocals, breakdowns and nasty tremolo picked riffs all thrown together in an incredibly aggressive (and very satisfying manner). Metal meets 'core but without the dumb HM-2 worship or 0000100100 songwriting.
Hurricane Death's demo is available at their bandcamp as a pay-what-you-want download, but if you're not feeling too stingy, you can head over to Castigated Recordsand snag yourself a tape.

Wednesday, 11 March 2015

If ever you wanted the experience of getting blackout drunk at the pub, wandering into a back alley and promptly passing out in a pool of your own vomit in musical form - Cuntz is your band.Perhaps you need a soundtrack fitting for your next neighborly dispute, something to accompany that thong you're planning to hurl at your neighbours forehead - try Cuntz.Trapped in suburbia with hundreds of metres of brown grasss, chain link fences and untidy lawn furniture the only thing in sight, and in desperate need of something just as disillusioned and bored as you are to keep you company - Cuntz.
If my abstract descriptions aren't doing it for you though, Cuntz are a four piece noise rock band from Melbourne who play scuzzy music laced with dry humour and a plethora of Australian cultural references (see the piss poor rendition of the riff from Thunderstruck at the end of Punt). With vocals that range from a spoken monotone to a delirious howl (glorious accent and all) backed with scraping, atonal guitar riffs and plodding basslines Cuntz is basically what happens to post punk if you lock in the car too long without the windows cracked while you go off to gamble your life savings away at the pokies. AND if all that doesn't have you racing for the download link, there's a fucking David Liebe Hart cover on here too.

Monday, 9 March 2015

Genre/s: Black Heavy Metal, Funeral DoomFor Fans Of: G.I.S.M, Master's Hammer, Funerary Bell, Venom, Hellhammer, King DiamondFavourite Track: My Soul/Primordial
Opened by cliche but pleasantly minimalistic revers Latin prayer to everybody's favourite fallen angel, 'All the Witches Dance' is a classic album with a somewhat misleading cover. When I say that I mean that although the work put into it (particularly the gawdy font at the bottom) is surpassed greatly by the skill and thought put into the album itself. The instrumentation on the second track, Primordial, sounds pretty punk influenced, which remains a presence throughout the remainder of the album, and thats what I think really sets this album aside, and why many cult metal and punk fans consider it a classic. That being said though, I don't want to jerk off an album like this too much, a lot of the tracks have a pretty demo-like quality which some people don't care for so I should mention that opinion on the album as well to be fair. All in all though I think if you're into anything from 80s era Japanese punk (the vocals reminded me of GISM a bit) to classic black metal like Venom and King Diamond then you'll probably get a good kick out of this album.

Thursday, 5 March 2015

The German metal underground is alive and well. Although this demo is now 6 years old, it's a fine example of that. 5 tracks of raging black/thrash with nary a moment's rest, and the kind of simple yet devastatingly effective vocal hooks which serve all forms of fast, aggressive music so well. For anyone familiar with the current scene in Germany, their "members of" list is an impressive CV, and this is reflected in the quality of the music. As with most of my posts, there's not much which is original here, but what is here is excellently made and performed. Highlights include 'Truppensturm' and 'Sturmbataillon'.